Embarrassingly, we currently import all our foot-and-mouth vaccines from Botswana. Manufacturing capacity at Onderstepoort Biological Products has declined significantly due to corruption and human resource challenges.

For some time now, the South African livestock industry has been struggling with foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), which presents enormous costs to farmers and agribusinesses. As the disease persists, the country's export growth ambitions are also at risk.

If South Africa is to escape this costly path, we must improve our handling of disease outbreaks. Indeed, there is a need for behaviour change and for farmers to be extra vigilant in the movement of livestock.

However, we must also explore whether a broad nationwide vaccination approach would not be the most effective path to handling these diseases. We have seen some countries that have followed this path, such as Brazil, and have successfully managed to control the disease while continuing their export activity over time.

Industry buy-in

To pursue such a path, we must have broad industry buy-in, especially from the major feedlots which are key to integrating small and medium-scale livestock farmers into the formal value chain.

Without drastic changes in our approach, we risk not only the prosperity of the industry, but also limiting the participation of small and medium-scale farmers in the value chain. The higher...